Emily NagoskiPhD · sex educator, author and speaker
No. Responsive desire is normal, and whether people like the sex they have matters more than spontaneous wanting or frequency.
What it rests onHer book description and her podcast episode both say plainly that spontaneous desire is not what a long relationship should be aiming at.
Source: pushkin.fm ↗
Esther PerelLMFT · psychotherapist, author and speaker on desire and relationships
No, and chasing it is the mistake. Give up the idea that desire falls from the sky and treat it as something you make room for on purpose.
What it rests onShe says the couples who keep desire alive have demystified the myth of spontaneity, and that committed sex is premeditated: willful, intentional, focused and present.
Source: ted.com ↗
Nagoski is writing mainly for women and for anyone told their desire is broken, and Perel is addressing established couples, most of them in her consulting room. The script is nobody's position: it is the assumption Nagoski and Perel are each pushing back on.
Low desire can also come from pain, medication, depression, endocrine problems, trauma, relationship distress, coercion, or a settled asexual identity, and none of those is answered by any of this.
Nagoski and Perel both reject spontaneity as the measure, both say the experience has to be wanted, and both say persistent distress deserves proper care rather than a technique.
For Nagoski: evidence that the contextual model is being used to wave away symptoms or to pressure a partner into sex they do not want.
For Perel: evidence that planning and intention flatten desire rather than protecting it, or that couples who schedule sex end up wanting each other less. For the common performance script: it is a belief rather than a claim, and what would change it is people being told, often enough, that the change they are feeling is ordinary.
You do, and your call is dated, kept, and yours to change. Follow the people you already trust and what they publish turns into a short daily practice.
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